Tara Ryan, Sarah Masters and Kira Reed held against their will in the Playboy limo

Bettie Page Uncensored star Sarah Masters poses with the Bettie Page look-alike contest winner

Heather Tyler and Sarah Masters try to escape Sexcetera’s ever-present camera

Kira Reed dons a Bettie wig to pose with Sarah

THE MAKING OF

PART 4 - The 2000 Edition!

The message was received by The Playground Theatre in Chicago. Representatives of the Playboy Channel show Sexcetera were trying to contact me about the play Bettie Page Uncensored, which was supposed to reopen the first weekend in October. Sexcetera wanted to do a segment on the making of the play and could come to town the first week of September. Gee, I thought to myself, we’d only be five weeks earlier than planned. That should be plenty of time to cast new actors, rehearse, get postcards and posters done. And get costumes. And arrange an opening party in town, with a look-alike contest -- all in just five weeks instead of eleven.

Help!

The show was on again, off again. The party was on again and off again. The party was finally set for The Fifth Floor club in town. Dana Teitelbaum from Jazz Baby Vintage on Clark Street came in as costumer. Carlos Ortega and Joe Cassidy (of Chicago bands Casolando and Butterfly Child, respectively) composed and recorded original music for the show, and recruited The Honeybees to perform a rockabilly tune. The Mistress of Mayhem allowed our place to be set up as a rehearsal studio. Then we discover that our party and show will be competing with the “Around the Coyote” festival here in town, with over forty theater groups showcasing plays while every art gallery in town threw parties to promote their openings. Yipes!

Here we were, preparing for the third run of Bettie Page Uncensored, cramming several hours of rehearsal into every couple of hours we could actually meet. 

The night of the Sexcetera party, the line to get into The Fifth Floor stretched down the street. Free booze the first two hours of the event set the tone for the party. People I had never met in my life were calling out my name. Before too long, it was almost impossible to move through the rooms in the club. I spent a good portion of the night looking for my wife, who arrived at midnight, dressed to the nines -- on the bus! The Playboy crew spent the next day shooting the cast’s only dress rehearsal. This, by the way, in theater is never done. Some complained of the brutal schedule, the lack of time and the presence of cameras. But all that was forgotten by evening. Our opening night played to a standing-room-only crowd. After the show, I was interviewed in front of the crowd by Sexcetera hostess Kira Reed, who held my hand on her breast and gave me a long, slow kiss. In front of the crowd, and my wife! It isn’t easy being the director. 

Kira sprung for a limo and the cast was off and running to go club-hopping. In these pictures, the exhaustion one might expect to see in the actors’ faces was replaced by exhilaration. Their hard work had helped pull off the impossible, and resulted in one of the best performances of the entire run of Bettie Page Uncensored. 

Not bad for a play that may be closing on November 18th. That’s right -- even as we begin to get national press, we may shut down the show to begin work on the film adaptation of Bettie Page Uncensored. If you want to be kept informed on pre-production deals on the film, events and national news coverage, e-mail Mike Flores here. And check out the Playboy Sexcetera web page at www.playboy.com/sex/sexcetera for info on the show

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